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Monday, October 5, 2009

Itty-Bitty Artists: Our First Meeting

Last week we had our first meeting of the Itty-Bitty Artists. We had 5 boys and 1 girl attend. The age range was 18 mos - 4 years. We began with finger painting. We gave each child a large piece of finger paint paper and asked them which colors (blue, yellow, red, and green) he/she would like to use. We put dabs of those colors on his/her paper. The children then began finger painting. It was fun to watch how different children and different ages responded.

After a few minutes, we showed the children how they could use plastic forks and toy cars to make prints in the finger paint. This was a huge hit! I especially recommend this for children who have sensory disorders.

We did not stop the children while they were creating. As each child finished, we helped him clean up. He/she was then able to choose a free play activity. We had Legos, blocks, puzzles, books, toy cars, plastic animals, etc. set out.

I intended to serve snack when everyone was finished finger painting. However, Wes had his own set of plans. He brought out the orange and black play dough and Halloween shaped cookie cutters that I had recently purchased. Needless to say, we began a second art session. The older children seemed to like playing with the dough more than the younger children. I believe this is because their fine motor skills are more developed, making it easier (and more fun) to manipulate the dough.

I thought it was interesting that one of the little boys picked up the toy cars (we had used during finger painting) and used them to create tracks in the dough. It is so cool that he made the connection ~ tracks in paint was cool, so let's try tracks in dough!

This week, we will be mixing yellow and red tempera paints to create orange. We will use the orange paint (as well as black) to make Halloween cookie cutter prints. If time permits, we will also paint with fall nature items: large leaves, twigs, acorns, pinecones, etc.

So, what art experiences have you and your little ones had this week?

What Is Itty-Bitty Artists?Itty-Bitty Artists is an art play group that I have started with some other moms in and around my neighborhood. However, it is also a new linky carnival I will host each Tuesday here at Raising Itty-Bitty Bookworms. Each Tuesday I will share pictures of what the children created during our art group. I will also share plans about what we will be doing at future group meetings. I would love for you to participate in this fun blog carnival by linking up!

Itty-Bitty ArtistsParticipation

Who can participate? Anyone! You do not have to belong to an art group to participate. If you do art with your child at home, please share your experiences. You can also choose to follow along with us and do the activities that we are doing.

Feel free to share current or past art experiences in which your child(ren) have participated.

Please include a link back here to my blog in your post.

You do not have to, but it would be greatly appreciated:-) if you used an Itty-Bitty Artists button in your post--you can grab one from my sidebar.

If you have any questions leave a comment or email me and I will gladly answer you!

6 comments:

I just had my first meeting of our art group on Friday...I am working on my post! It will be nice to see what another group is doing. We had a free playdough time, an open ended art project and then a craft.

What a great idea Tara! I've just moved and don't know many people in our area, so I can't start an art playgroup. Perhaps sometime in the future this will be possible. It looks like so much fun. In the meantime, I love the blog carnival idea. I have added my post and will add a button to my blog.